BETA: Craft your own experience with Personal Sections on tvOS and iOS

[maddox]

@Fofer

but it might make more sense to folks if an alert could pop up in CDVR, when a user tries to exceed that limit, so they understand what's going on

Yeah I got too excited and shipped it off before doing that

[Fofer]

Speaking of the 15 item limit, I'm brainstorming ways to consolidate our sections in a way that makes the most sense.

Can "Schedule" be added as a Channels Section in the available list, so we can put it inside one of our Personal Sections and not have it take up its own slot in the sidebar?

[maddox]

Yep. I must have left it off. Good catch.

[maddox]

@Fofer

I can rearrange these sections now, and see the clients' sidebars update on tvOS in real-time, but the 4 Personal Sections that I designed and chose, just aren't appearing on either of the two AppleTV's that I tested this on.

Anything else I can try? I sent logs again from the CDVR web UI...

Again, I checked and see no items in the setting for your sidebar navigation. I'm very confused by this.

Please wait for the next pre-release, as it has improved diagnostics for personal sections, and submit from that.

[Fofer]

OK thanks. Very strange that these were working fine for me just yesterday afternoon. Happy to wait though and resubmit logs with the next pre-release.

[maddox]

@Fofer

Can "Schedule" be added as a Channels Section in the available list

@Fofer

it might make more sense to folks if an alert could pop up in CDVR, when a user tries to exceed that limit

These were resolved in the latest pre-release.

DVR Pre-Release Notes

v2024.07.09.1812 • IMPROVED: Sidebar navigation editor now limits the number of items you can add. • IMPROVED: Schedule is now available as a section button for button rows in Personal Sections

[Fofer]

@Fofer

I updated to the latest pre-release of the CDVR server and the latest TestFlight of the Channels client. Then I started fresh with my sidebar navigation items, and added 14 of them (10 default sections and 4 Personal Sections) but, unfortunately only the 10 default sections appear. I can rearrange these sections now, and see the clients' sidebars update on tvOS in real-time, but the 4 Personal Sections that I designed and chose, just aren't appearing on either of the two AppleTV's that I tested this on.

Anything else I can try? I sent logs again from the CDVR web UI...

Update: I've fixed the issue over here, but I'm not entirely sure what made the difference. I figured it might have something to do with whatever Personal Channel edits or additions I made since yesterday. First I went into my "Apps" Personal Section, which is a big grid of shortcuts to many A/V apps we use. I removed some of them, moved others around a bit. Then I tested and saw that the Personal Channel sidebar items were appearing again, on both AppleTV's!

Then to test, I added back the same buttons I'd just removed, and confirmed that the Personal Channels are still appearing in the sidebar... so it feels like I'm back in business

What's odd is that the crash happened earlier, even if I hadn't chosen the "Apps" Personal Collection to appear in my sidebar.

Ah well. Glad it's fixed now. Maybe this experience will help if someone else finds themselves in the same boat. Maybe someone will be able to recreate the issue, by copying this grid of app shortcuts, or something like it...

Yes, we'll be paring these down and removing 3-4 buttons. Just sharing these as inspiration for others for now...

[Fofer]

Two discoveries I wanted to share with the rest of the class:

• A URL button can launch the YouTube app, or any app you have the proper URL for. But you can also set one up to stream a specific YouTube video. Or even a livestream. There are thousands of webcams and great music streams all over YouTube to choose from...

Just append the video's URL after the youtube:// prefix.

Here's one of Lofi Girls' 24/7 ambient music streams:

youtube://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uLi1I3G2N4

• Once in any external app (after using one of these URL buttons inside Channels,) when you do want to exit that app, just tap "back" on your remote, sometimes a few back steps are required, but that will land you right back into the Channels app. It feels really seamless. Out of all of my URL buttons, the only app that didn't cooperate this nicely is Amazon Prime Video. That's the only app that exited out to the tvOS Home Screen instead. Not a big deal, but notable to mention.

[cherlihy]

This doesn't appear to be working for me on FireStick4k with ChannelsDVR for Synology. Is there a reference to a online HELP page to walk me through proper setup?

[maddox]

Please read the original post and/or title.

This is only for tvOS at the moment. There is no Android TV or Fire TV support for this feature.

[cherlihy]

Thanks!

[jamesrw]

Not sure how feasible it is but what do you think about allowing the use of spacers or divider lines in the sidebar? They could still count against the 15 line limit to ensure no runoff. Mockup incoming...

[maddox]

Interesting suggestion. We'll keep it in mind.

This is why we want you guys using this stuff while we work on it.

[jasonmcroy]

I love this idea!

[Fofer]

I do too

[speedingcheetah]

I think Sort order has an issue on the Admin UI.

I have a Section, Content Type - Video Group.

Sort - Alphabetically. Sort Order - Forward.

When set to Forward, the Admin UI show the video groups in Reverse order (Z to A).
On the client, it is correct in Forward (A to Z).

When i set it to Reverse in Admin Ui, it shows as Forward in Admin UI, But correctly in client as in Reverse.

EDIT. Never mind. Seems you need to have the "Sort Title" filled in in your Video Group, else it messed up how the Personal sections sort it. I had 2 of my 5 Groups have a Sort Title, and the other 3 did not. Once i added that, sort works fine.

[maddox]

@speedingcheetah

Seems you need to have the "Sort Title" filled in in your Video Group, else it messed up how the Personal sections sort it.

Hmm, that's still a bug. I'll check it out. When sorting, it should fall back to the Title if the Sort Title is blank. Thanks.

[cyoungers]

While we are dreaming about features, how about a sidebar with expanding menu options? As you scroll down and highlight an entry, some entries will auto expand to reveal multiple sub-items. Or maybe instead of auto expanding, sidebar items have an arrow character indicating that there are menu options underneath and you long press or right click to reveal.

[cyberskier]

@maddox

You can now manually add items to the list of sections showing in your sidebar, as well as reorder them.

I’m being dense I’m sure, but where do I find the setting to customize the sidebar? I’ve got a Personal Section set up properly, but now don’t know where I go to configure the sidebar. I’ve poked around in the server settings but can’t find it.